Steering Committee

Steering Committee

Yoshith Perera

Co-director / Co-directeur

Yoshith Perera is an out of the box thinker with dreams of leading a global not-for-profit. Advocating for equity and social justice, he uses traditional and virtual platforms to galvanize social change. With research interests in communications and leadership, his work in the use of "Digital Technologies for Population Health and Health Equity Gains" was published with the Journal of Public Health Policy recently. With experience facilitating panel discussions, focus groups and advocacy projects, he values the precipitation and implementation of qualitative data. His recent contributions in public relations earned him the 2016 Publicist of the Year award, by District 86 Toastmasters.

Janet Hélène Zanin

Co-Director / Co-Directrice

Janet Hélène Zanin holds a Master's of Science in Global Health from McMaster University and is currently a student in the nursing program. Previous professional experience includes non-profit management, knowledge-translation, health systems research, and international development work in Southeast Asia and Central America. Janet returns to MentorNet as Co-Director after previous experience as a Student-Young-Professional.

Michelle Amri

Program Liaison / Agente de liaison

Michelle is a public health and public policy specialist. Her initial introduction in global health was at the World Health Organization (WHO)’s Regional Office for the Western Pacific in Manila, Philippines, primarily working on smoke-free cities and health promotion leadership and financing. Michelle later returned as a Health Promotion Consultant working on urban health for the region. She holds the degrees of Honors Bachelor of Health Sciences (Specialization in Health Promotion) from the University of Western Ontario and a Master of Public Administration from Queen’s University. She will begin her PhD in Public Health at the University of Toronto in 2017.

Dilani Logan

Program Liaison / Agente de liaison

Dilani Logan is currently a Master of Science Candidate, studying Global Health at Duke University. She is from Mississauga, Ontario, and recently graduated from Western University with a double major in Medical Science and Spanish, and a minor in Global Development Studies. Dilani’s passion and interest in global health is greatly centred around health equity, global health policy, and health systems strengthening. Her past experiences working in social services at the Ontario Disability Support Program enhanced her views regarding the importance of easily accessible healthcare resources. In her spare time, Dilani loves travelling (or planning her next adventure), running, and biking.

Vivienne Steele

Program Liaison / Agente de liaison

Vivienne is completing a Master's in Epidemiology at the University of Guelph. Vivienne's research focuses on access to maternal health care services in rural Uganda using data she collected during visits to Bwindi Community Hospital in 2015 as part of the Indigenous Health Adaptation to Climate Change project.

Li Feng Xie

Program Liaison / Agente de liaison

Li Feng Xie is a registered dietitian graduated from McGill University and she is currently pursuing her Master studies in Biomedical Sciences at Université de Montréal. The focus of her research work is bone and metabolic health of young adults born preterm. She has a great interest in understanding determinants of health. Her passion for global health is strongly related to her travel experiences. While traveling, she pays special attention to differences between environment and lifestyle of people around the world, in which way those factors interact with health status and how can we find culturally appropriate solutions. After her Master's program, she would like to continue studies in nutritional epidemiology in order to become a dietitian-researcher.

Shweta Dhawan

Advisor / Conseillère

Shweta holds a Master of Public Health from the University of Alberta and a Honours Bachelor of Science in Integrative Biology and Psychology from the University of Toronto. Presently, she is studying medicine at Dalhousie University. She has diverse global health-related experience in non-profit, research and government settings in Canada, India, Philippines and Cambodia including with the World Health Organization, Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, regional and provincial health authorities. Shweta has been involved with MentorNet for the past four years- one year as a steering committee member and three years as a co-director.

Emily Kocsis

Advisor / Conseillère

Emily earned her Master’s of Science in Global Health from McMaster University in 2014. During her studies, she had the opportunity to work as a Research Assistant in rural Kenya. She has also worked on research projects broadly related to food systems and the cultural, social and economic barriers to food security and nutrition in both India and Vietnam. She currently works for the Canadian Coalition for Global Health Research (CCGHR) as a Research Officer. also supporting the CCGHR SYP Network. Emily has been involved with MentorNet for just over 3 years: first as a SYP, then as a steering committee member, and finally, taking on the role of program Co-Director in 2015.